1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a portable evaluator of amount of exercise and the method of evaluating amount of exercise. In particular, the invention relates to a portable evaluator of amount of exercise and the method of evaluating amount of exercise that can identify user's exercise type and use different formulas to calculate the amount of exercise thereof.
2. Description of Related Art
Due to changes in diet habit and lifestyle, obesity has become an important factor that affects human health nowadays. Countless cases of obesity eventually result in cardiovascular diseases. People are thus more conscious about weight control these days. According to most nutritionists, the best method to control weight is not restricted diet but regular exercise instead. In addition to having the habit of exercising daily or weekly, it is also important to have appropriate amount of exercise. However, the “appropriate” amount of exercise differs among people of different genders and builds. To evaluate whether a daily amount of exercise is too much or insufficient, an exerciser usually uses an evaluator of amount of exercise. The most common evaluator is the pedometer.
ROC Pat. No. TW 382450 discloses a pedometer that has a housing, a circuit board, a swinging element, and a triggering element. The circuit board has a switch. The triggering element is disposed on the swinging element. The step-counting principle is as the following. When the user walks one step, his or her body shakes up and down, which in turn swings the swinging element once. Every time the swinging element swings, the triggering element is driven to hit the switch of the circuit board. The switch is then turned on and off once to count the number of steps that the user has walked.
Besides, there is a tri-axis acceleration pedometer that uses tri-axis acceleration to count the number of steps. The device has an acceleration sensor for detecting the vertical vibrations (in the Z-axis, for example) caused by the user during a walk or run to obtain several peak values. A threshold peak value is also set in the tri-axis acceleration pedometer. Therefore, the detected peak values and the threshold peak values are compared to see how many peak values are greater than the threshold peak value, thereby determining the number of steps. In addition, the user's height can be entered as reference data for calculating the number of steps into a distance, thereby calculating a walking speed. The walking speed is plugged into a calorie consumption formula: 1.25×walking speed (C/Kg/h), to obtain the calorie consumed by the user.
However, the above-mentioned two pedometers only measure the vertical vibrations caused by walking or running. Exercises such as sit-up and push-up involve rotations that do not produce obvious vertical vibrations. Therefore, the above-mentioned two pedometers cannot evaluate the amount of such exercises. In other words, the above-mentioned two pedometers cannot be applied to users of all kinds of exercises.